For years now the media’s used rhetorical tricks to bait our side into divisive arguments based on the kind of false premise Democrats never face. Whether it’s abortion, contraception, same-sex marriage, or guns — the media hits us again and again and again until someone like a Todd Akin says something stupid enough it can be used to tar the party as a whole and our presidential nominee.

This isn’t fair, but it is reality. Complaining about it will get you nowhere and exposing it has proven absolutely worthless because you can’t shame the shameless.

Instead, we have to start beating the media at its own game.

After Fox News rose to prominence, Democrats trained themselves to face the likes of Bill O’Reilly and Megyn Kelly. Because Democrats weren’t used to being challenged, they were frequently caught off guard, the videos would go viral online, and the damage would be done. You don’t see this happen anywhere near as often as you did ten years ago. That’s because Democrats fixed the problem.

Republicans need to first come to terms with the fact that they have a problem, a big one. Then they need to man up, go to school, and do something about it.

And they can start by studying Shapiro’s CNN appearance last night like the Super Bowl game-tape it is.

Ben put into practice something that Andrew Breitbart preached throughout his career of battling the mainstream media: Question the premise, whether it’s an assertion that you don’t care about the victims of Sandy Hook, or a faulty definition of Critical Race Theory, or that Barack Obama is a nice guy who only wants America to succeed. Ben destroyed the faulty premise of the gun control debate last night. And the debate is now changed.

5 Comments, 5 Threads

Ace suggested that Piers Morgan is modeling his career on that of Geraldo Rivera. But I would note just describing Piers as Rivera or Downey does not capture entirely what he is up to.

Since Piers had failing ratings at CNN, he decided to jump all over a controversial issue, go to the left on it, and hope he could get some attention and ratings. I am sure it has worked, at least in the sort term. But he has to sustain it now. Can we expect Piers to be a mini MSNBC franchise over at CNN? One Martin Bashir is enough!

No matter how you answer it, you look bad unless you recognize the tacit accusation and confront it directly. These kind of questions come at you all the time (I once had a cold caller ask me something to the effect “Do you want to be a financial failure all your life or take advantage of this sure-thing penny stock I’m offering to sell you?” I wonder if the hearing has come back in that ear yet) and can derail you if you aren’t prepared.

Someone should give conservative politicians who want to go national classes in dealing with journ0list creeps and these kinds of questions.

“Republicans need to first come to terms with the fact that they have a problem, a big one. Then they need to man up, go to school, and do something about it.”

IMHO – this was where Republican’s failed in 2008 and I had hoped they learned their lesson in 2012. They didn’t. My feeling was that it didn’t matter who the proposed field of candidates was that ALL OF THEM should receive solid, effective media training and support from the RNC in order to deal with the destruction that the media was delivering against all of the candidates on a daily basis. By allowing the MSM to control the candidates, it didn’t matter who won the primaries… they had been significantly damaged early and often which left their hands tied in the General Election.